The legacy of Depression-era San Francisco

CaptionDepression-era San Francisco

By Christopher Reynolds, Los Angeles Times staff writer Stocks have crashed, industry is shuddering and banks are failing. The restless unemployed will soon fill the streets. Yet in San Francisco, some crazed optimist in the Pacific Stock Exchange Tower has hired Diego Rivera to decorate a private club for stockbrokers. Could this be the most doomed, stupid idea of all 1930? Here is Rivera, an intermittent communist who'd met with Stalin in Russia only two years before, perched on the scaffolding above the financial titans of Sansome Street. He's supposed to sketch grand visions of happy, healthy California, its produce plump and shiny, its hills dotted with oil wells, the Golden State agleam with capitalism. All this, a year into the Great Depression. What is the muralist thinking? What are the stockbrokers thinking?

By Christopher Reynolds, Los Angeles Times staff writer Stocks have crashed, industry is shuddering and banks are failing. The restless unemployed will soon fill the streets. Yet in San Francisco, some crazed optimist in the Pacific Stock Exchange Tower has hired Diego Rivera to decorate a private club for stockbrokers. Could this be the most doomed, stupid idea of all 1930? Here is Rivera, an intermittent communist who'd met with Stalin in Russia only two years before, perched on the scaffolding above the financial titans of Sansome Street. He's supposed to sketch grand visions of happy, healthy California, its produce plump and shiny, its hills dotted with oil wells, the Golden State agleam with capitalism. All this, a year into the Great Depression. What is the muralist thinking? What are the stockbrokers thinking?

Even as I stand before the mural on a Friday morning last month, my eyes an inch from the artist's brush strokes, I can't quite imagine. But I do feel a little closer to the 1930s, and I know I'm not the only one who has been wondering lately about those years. The remedy is a trip to San Francisco -- good not only for plain fun but also for some encouraging revelations. In the face of the hard times between 1929 and 1941, including a bitter maritime strike in 1934, all sorts of strange and wonderful creations and transformations emerged here. Murals. Bridges. Even a couple of islands. In my single-minded mission, I made it to the first nine of these 11 Depression-era landmarks in 24 hours. As a saner, slower traveler, you could easily cover five in a weekend. Most are inexpensive or free. And you've probably already visited several Depression landmarks without thinking of them that way. The Golden Gate Bridge, for instance. Or the Top of the Mark, the bar that hovers 19 stories above the top of posh Nob Hill. Or Coit Tower. Or, if you're driving in from the Oakland airport as I did, the Bay Bridge beneath your wheels.

Even as I stand before the mural on a Friday morning last month, my eyes an inch from the artist's brush strokes, I can't quite imagine. But I do feel a little closer to the 1930s, and I know I'm not the only one who has been wondering lately about those years. The remedy is a trip to San Francisco -- good not only for plain fun but also for some encouraging revelations. In the face of the hard times between 1929 and 1941, including a bitter maritime strike in 1934, all sorts of strange and wonderful creations and transformations emerged here. Murals. Bridges. Even a couple of islands. In my single-minded mission, I made it to the first nine of these 11 Depression-era landmarks in 24 hours. As a saner, slower traveler, you could easily cover five in a weekend. Most are inexpensive or free. And you've probably already visited several Depression landmarks without thinking of them that way. The Golden Gate Bridge, for instance. Or the Top of the Mark, the bar that hovers 19 stories above the top of posh Nob Hill. Or Coit Tower. Or, if you're driving in from the Oakland airport as I did, the Bay Bridge beneath your wheels.